


Paraphernalia of the Dead

by TheOnlyHuman



Series: Dark Claws: What-ifs [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Bat Fam show up, Bat Family, Bruce sorta isn't constipated emotionally, Deep Claws, Female Dick Grayson, God damnit, I just accidentally tapped on a suggested tag and deleted my whole list, I've got too many tags already, a bit like an angel demon au, an AU inside of my other AU, angels get a brief cameo, because the main chara is a ghost, but not, but not the future because it's no fun, dick grayson is female, eh idk, enjoy, evil ghosts, ghost au, its a fun au tho, mean ghosts, nice ghosts, so ghost and demon au?, some action in the past and present, some death but our main character is a ghost, whaddaya expect?, yeah - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-14
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-08-23 19:28:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 9,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16625042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOnlyHuman/pseuds/TheOnlyHuman
Summary: She died in 1945. She's still around today, in 2019.Why and how, you ask? Well, it's a long story.Basically, she's a ghost.Yeah, and she's probably seen way too much and Anca's sure that qualifies her as a ghost, if anything. (Definitely not because she's seen too many of her friends be buried in the graves out the back of the Wayne lands. Nope.)





	1. The Flying Graysons

They're called The Flying Graysons and fly they do. Solomon sits in his seat near the front, shocked into beautiful awe of the people that twirl above him like angels. Never in his seventy-eight years of life has he seen something as wonderful as this circus act.

A family too. A mother, father and only child; a daughter.

The mother steps up to the edge of the platform and raises her arms, light glimmering off her teeth as she grins. Cheers echo around the tent which Solomon happily joins in with.

She grips onto the swing and pushes herself away from the wood, twirling and spinning and jumping on that very swing, smiling all the while. After a few, she jumps to an idle swing off to her right and pushes the previous one back to her busband. She is like a graceful bird, primed and ready for a flight that it knows it will enjoy.

The male is not as flexible as his wife and so he pushes his strength into his arms, using it to hold onto his wife's hands when she lunges at him. They are graceful in their show and they both smile brighter than the sun.

Together they create an astonishing picture, one of ignorant, blissful joy and freedom and for a few seconds Solomon imagines he himself up there too, with Joshua maybe, both of them much, _much_ younger though. He dreams to be as happy as some random circus dwellers.

Solomon is clapping with everyone else as the husband hooks his legs around the swing and unfolds upside down, his wife clutching to his hands. They both smile at the small child standing on the podium and the mother holds out her hands. Beckoning her.

What follows happens as if Solomon is standing in the middle of a horrifying theater play.

The rope holding up the swing snaps. Snaps in half.

The crunch of bones, the sudden hush of the audience, including himself, and the child's screams will forever echo in his ears.

A moment passes and the Ring Master is there, looking horrified like the rest of them all, urging everyone to stay back. A man charges forward, claiming he's a doctor and someone makes for the ladder to get the child down.

Solomon feels the need to do something burn in his stomach but he is old and his bones brittle. He wants to be the one to climb that ladder or be one of those few whom kneel beside the parents as blood pools around their forms but his stick is too thick for a ladder and his knees won't bend that far. He is but a useless old man. There is nothing he can do.

A cry hollows out his chest and his heart thumps. His head lightens as he looks up to find a sight that will stay with him no matter how long.

A man is standing opposite the girl, she looks angry and he desperate. Solomon stands to shout for the man to stop for the girl is too close to the edge, trapezist or not, but she turns around and in the flurry of her black hair unfurling around her she makes eye contact with him. Solomon sees how her beautiful snow blue eyes glint with too many emotions before she walks forward.

Solomon is silent as the girl falls, silent as her eyes close and she collapses into the grounds embrace. He stands there as people scream and he stands there for a very long time afterward, even as people leave and the police urge him to too.

When the Ring Master admits he has not enough money for a burial, Solomon offers it and the land. Joshua doesn't speak of it and for that, he is glad.


	2. Glossy Graves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A glance to her other side, her left, has her finding two other graves, an' their stones.
> 
> Her mami and tatic are in those'ns.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anca has a bit of a "nay" thing going on for things like don't. The "n't" is turned into "nay" because I'm trying to make her sound like an 'uneducated' circus performer. Remember that this is the late 1940's too.
> 
> No offense intended.

Anca wakes up and she is numb.

Her  _mami_ and  _tatic_ are gone and she has seen too much to sleep. She wonders why she has woken up at all, for she had walked off their platform which they all owned and she did not intend to come back. Was God so cruel as to not grant her the allowance to be with her parents?

She wonders of this for a while before she notices how she stands above a soil covered patch of earth. If she weren't dreaming she believes the land would've been cold, wetting the souls of her feet, as well as her oddly white dress, if the rain that lathers down woefully means anything. The day is dark and the sun's light is scarce and Anca stares at a slab of stone planted in the ground where the freshly dug up soil sits.

If she could feel it would probably be cold and wet but she cannaye so she remembers all those times she has ran her fingers through the bath tin's cooling water and remembers how it felt. She images running her hand down the side of their caravan when it is night, recalls the way that feeling had made her shiver and pushes it to the forefront of her mind and pretends she feels those feelings when she reaches out and her hand merely passes through the rounded off stone.

Lightning flashes behind her but the sound is muted, muted as she catches a glimpse of her name engraved in the stone. Her heart does not thud nor does her tummy squeal and twist. She feels nothing inside yet her eyes widen and her mouth parts in shock.

She is numb yet she is not.

Anca cannaye read more than her name but she knows well enough what goes after it when such a possession is placed upon a grave stone.

Her name: Anca R. Grayson.

The squiggles next are what she assumes to be the dates. The date she was born then the one she died upon, if her  _tatic_  was right when he explained it to her.

There is another line of things,  _words of remembrance,_ _mami_  had said after thinking about it for a few.  _It is how people know what you where, some nice things may also be put upon it._

Anca cannaye read it but the squiggles look pretty so she does'nay fret.

A glance to her other side, her left, has her finding two other graves, an' their stones.

Anca does not look because she knows.

Her  _mami_ and  _tatic_  are in those'ns.

She knows.

-/-/-

Anca stays round the graves for a bit more. Watching them, as if expecting her parents to appear too, like her. She waits and she waits til she is desperate and she wishes she could feel the cold, for she cannaye feel the ground nor the wind that gives the trees whiplash and makes them sway like scrambling, rushed animals.

She stands til her legs get tired, or feel like they should but are not, and then she intends to sit but forgets she is standing and ends up floating in the air, legs crossed.

Anca cannaye tell time nor can she count but she knows she has waited for too long, especially when the storm clouds vanish and the wind appears to stop and the sun rises from the arch of land that is clustered with other trees. Anca now knows she is not dreaming and with that she does'nay know how'ta feel.

She can not feel anyway so it does'nay matter.

Anca experiments with the trees when she does'nay want'ta sit looking at her  _mami_ and  _tatic's_ graves for much longer. She floats by them for she finds it gives her more feeling than walking does, even if it is still near to nothing.

With the trees she pushes her hand forwards and finds it goes right through, she realises this will happen with everything but the ground and walls once she tries it with a few more trees and a hut. She still feels numb and as she lowers herself to the ground and listens she feels sadder than before.

What is the point in living if she cannaye feel the wind against her face, cannaye feel the grass between her toes and she cannaye feel the smooth sharpness of freshly cut stone edges?

When the sun hovers directly above her Anca comes to the understanding that she is being punished. She has failed in life and she is paying the price. Her parents died doing what they loved thus they got through to heaven while she died in sadness and desperation.

She does'nay deserve the joy of peace. Maybe that is what God believes.

Anca is not at all pleased.

-/-/-

When she explores further Anca finds a grand house in the distance. It is bricked and large and Anca can only think that the entire circus would be able to live in it.

When she goes over to it, she finds she can run just as well as she used to and the sight becomes more grandiose than anything she has ever seen.

It is draconian in colour, being dark and brooding, but it towers above all with many windows in lines and with more buildings stretching out of both sides and shaping the back into a sort of a half square.

Anca knows what a square is.

 _Tatic_ had liked them. He'd always pointed them out to her for  _tatic_  had been smart and had been taught by his parents. He'd started teaching her shapes before he...

Something fluttered past in the corner of her eye and Anca turned her head to look. What had caught her eye was'nay the large window that gleaned in the sun's rays but the elderly man that stood by it, eyes wide.

Anca waves, expecting nothing, but the man gapes at her and Anca stops cold.


	3. The First Wayne to See

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So maybe old people aren't that scary?

Anca passes it off as the man seeing something behind her as he grips onto his walking stick and pushes the glass. It opens like a door and Anca realises it is one and that, she finds, is beautiful.

The man walks straight for her and Anca looks behind her and finds nothing but a lone, young tree. There is nothing for him to walk towards unless he is headed for the tree. Dismissing this all entirely, she turns to go but the man stops her.

"Wait," he says and he has the rasping tenor of a man ageing. He has the lilt of wisdom and the sag of years. She turns and finds he is walking quicker, pushing his walking stick out further in an effort to speed up. "I- please, wait."

Anca lets him get close, lets him walk over til she sees the greying roots of his black shiney hair and the crows feet at his eyes much better than she had before. She does nothing but stand there, unsure of what to do as the man reaches out and his hand does nothing but pass right through her.

His eyes are wide and she nods.

"I am dead," she says. "God is punishing me for before, thus here I am."

He does'nay respond. Instead his eyes whip up to the right, towards the trees and the patch of clear land Anca knows to house the graves.

"You are the girl," he responds finally. He does'nay continue. Anca does for him.

"Indeed."

He readjusts his grip on his walking stick and Anca notices the bat carved into the handle. It is pretty and an odd colour, of which reminds her of the red-orange colour that had been on their tin caravan.  _Tatic_ had called it rust but this man seems to like his rust, unlike  _tatic,_  as his is shiney, as if he polished it.

 _How odd,_ Anca thinks just as he opens his mouth and speaks.

"I must be going crazy," he proclaims, running his hand through his greying hair. Anca merely crosses her legs as she floats. "You're the girl?"

The last is a question to which she nods. He stares for a moment then nods back and motions towards the open window door.

"Would you like to come in?"

 

-/-/-

 

The man's name is Solomon.

Solomon Wayne.

He is nice and down to earth, if Anca is describing him in such a way that her  _mami_  would've. Solomon has a brother, Joshua, and Joshua could'nay see Anca for she tried and she walked in front of him and he did'nay react.

Solomon told her to not mind, for Joshua was "much more focussed on other things and wasn't too friendly to new people".

Anca pretended she was'nay annoyed.

Solomon showed her the house, he showed her the different floors. Of which, he said, there were six. Anca knew six was a number but of how many that was she did'nay know.

There was a room - a large one - filled with stunning wood carved shelves that had frames and stood independant of the wall. Bookcases, Solomon said. For the books.

And books there were. The brothers had many, more than Anca had ever seen, and each one was different with covers that she could'nay touch or move. She tried to pick one up and only pushed it and the one next to it off the shelf.

Anca had apologized and watched painstakingly as Solomon had had to bend over to pick it up.

He was 78, Solomon.

Anca knew that was old. Her  _tatic_ had been 39. Solomon had made a pained noise and an odd face when she'd said this so Anca never repeated it. Her  _mami_  had been 37, if she remembered her saying right.

Anca thinks she's ten. She is'nay sure.

When she asks, Solomon is reading a book in the room of books, which he calls the  _library._

"How old am I?" She asks as she slips in through the door that is open by a hair. It slides open further as she pushes by and Anca sees the fire in the hearth flicker.

Solomon looks up, his glasses perched upon his nose. He looks confused. How Anca wishes to feel confusion once more. "You do not know?"

"Nae," she says honestly and floats above the chair that is pulled out for her, pretending she is sitting upon it. "I think it is on my stone but I cannay read it."

Solomon looks dismayed at this, "Is it dirty?"

 _No,_ she thinks and knows it is not. Solomon, even in his age and her pestering for him to not, cleans her gravestone of all dirt and plants along with her  _mami_  and  _tatic's_ and his  _tatic's_ every fortnight.

This is one of the things Joshua fights with him about.

Anca thinks of those fights and smushes her lips together into a thin line. Joshua believes his older brother to be going mad, taking seemingly to himself as he is, and Anca knows Solomon is old. He should'nay be pushing himself but he does and Joshua is never pleased.

They fight and Anca will never stay in the same room as them for those, not after the first time.

She shakes her head as  _no_  and does'nay speak.

Solomon too falls silent and he drops the page that was lingering on his fingertips, held up halfway. When he does speak his tone is quiet and reassuring,  _knowing_ too.

"You cannot read, can you?"

She responds with more force than is necessary. "Of what is it to you?"

Solomon's response is cut off by the Wayne family butler knocking on the slightly agape door.

The man is Jarvis H. Pennyworth and he is 46, if Anca remembers correctly. He is quiet and calm, lurking in the shadows like a snake yet forever loyal like a dog, eternally man's friend.

Presently, Jarvis pushes the heavy oak door open and strides in with a shining tray with a teapot and cup placed upon it. "Tea, sir?"

"Of course," Solomon says, thoughts temporarily derailed. "Thank you, Jarvis."

"It's my pleasure, sir," Jarvis says as he sets down the plate and saucer. He fills the cup with tea promptly and drops in two sugars as usual. "Anything else I can get you?"

His eyes cast her way, at the supposedly empty but pulled out chair, and twinkle. This is what makes Anca unsure around the butler, he does'nay react as if he sees her but his eyes always twinkle when he looks her way.

Perhaps that is telling enough.

"No, thank you, Jarvis." Solomon says and casts her a look as she rises up and lies on her back, kicking her legs out with her arms behind her head.

Jarvis disappears with a small nod and a smile and Anca closes her eyes.

"I could teach you," Solomon says later. The words startle Anca into dropping her floating form. She ends up crashing into the chair and sending it onto its back.

"Pardon?" She says sitting up and popping her head over the edge of the table, just enough to see him. Solomon is very particular about manners.

"How to read and write," he clarifies, sipping at his tea. "I could teach you if you'd like?"

She offers him a small, shy smile and he smiles back.


	4. Whiteboards, Sons and Markers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We catch a glimpse of Thomas and we meet Joshua.

Years pass and Anca becomes familiar with the Wayne grounds, familiar with the way the stairs creak just right if she stands in the right places, familiar with the way everything is run and moreso the way the brothers act.

Today, Thomas is here. Sitting with his father, Solomon, in the main living room.

To Anca, whom has not aged in the past 2 years but has minorly changed mentally, Thomas is dashing and young. At 10 he has the eyebrows of Solomon and the straight back of a dedicated man.

Anca does'nay doubt he will become a doctor or something of the sort. He has the brains too, that much is evident.

"How have you been lately, father?" The boy asks and manners he has indeed.

"I have been well, Thomas," Solomon smiles and he smiles in that way Anca has only ever seen him smile with Joshua and her. It's loving and soft. A sure sign of his loyalty to one. "And you?"

"I too, have been well," Thomas nods, almost to himself. Anca has to say, the way the boy talks is most peculiar in and of itself. "Mother bought me a pen the other day, she insists I must write more."

"Oh?" Solomon says with the captivity only a loved one can have when talking about _pens._ "Very good, writing is a prized skill to have."

That, Anca knows, is true. It's been two years since Solomon taught her both how to read and how to write, counting included, and she will forever be grateful.

Thomas seems to know too, and with unprofound knowledge he nods with his father. "Indeed, I know. Nonetheless, she has been pestering me to write to a penpal, even though I don't have one."

"Your mother always was persistent." Solomon says and from that alone Anca knows he misses the woman.

They'd had a falling out, according to Solomon himself. When Thomas was 3 and too young to remember Solomon and Agatha, the boys mother and Solomon's ex-wife, had fought and the outcome had been so vicious that Agatha had taken Thomas with her when she'd left. When Anca had asked if he missed her, Solomon had confided in her that he was merely grateful that he could still see Thomas.

Anca was sure that meant he missed her. His words now were proof enough.

Thomas seemed to sense this too and nodded before steering the conversation away from the controversal topic. "She still is. Why, did you see last week's match; the Gotham Knights won!"

Solomon's face lit up as he got into his talk of football. "Yes! Did you see how Lorya stormed through those Californian wimps like a beast? It was simply magnificent."

Anca was'nay fond of football so she decided to leave while she still could.

 

-/-/-

 

Joshua sighed, pulling up his goggles as the wires just wouldn't stay put. He was trying to make a better security system, possibly one that scanned for identified heat signatures or something of the like. He wasn't too sure yet.

He wanted the Manor to be the most secure place in the whole of Gotham.

His goggles were dumped upon his workbench as he pushed his seat back and stood up. He'd have to stop coming down here soon, or possibly move his workplace upstairs as now with his back the very thought of climbing those stairs to the Manor put him in an awful mood.

The cold draft that came with Solomon's _friend_ appeared behind him and he barely spared the thing a glance, knowing he wouldn't see anything.

Joshua was an inventor, certainly no scientist, but he had purposely lived his entire life believeing ghosts and the like were not real, especially with father falling to madness in his last few years, muttering necessantly about _owls_. Now to suddenly have his elder brother talking to a _ghost_ and befriending one? It was mind boggling.

The draft swirled over to his workbench, then slithered over his shoulders and Joshua just knew it was inquiring as to what he was doing.

"I'm trying to improve our security," he said to seemingly air. It made him feel stupid and he gritted his teeth minutely before turning and striding over to a cabinet which held some of his work paraphernalia.

Joshua opened the doors and the draft swerved over his head inquisitively. He grabbed the minature whiteboard from a shelf within and grabbed the marker.

He strode over to a different bench this time and set the board and marker down. "Can you pick things up?" He asked.

The wind flicked at his hair in a yes.

"And write?"

Another yes, this time seemingly more endearing as it lingered.

"Can you write something then?" He asked and felt silly, "Just so I know you are real and not just the wind."

Not that the wind would make it to such caves as these, underground an entire Manor and all but still. Joshua was an inventor and like scientists, inventors experimented. Whether or not they thought about it beforehand was a different matter.

A few seconds that seemed to drag expired and Joshua got ready to leave and do something better with his time, like trying to rope Thomas into helping him (for this was the 29th and a Friday and he knew Solomon's son would be here) because the boy had a good feel for experiments and wiring. The marker moved and Joshua stopped in his tracks.

It rolled back and forth like the thing was debating what to write and Joshua couldn't say anything.

Eventually, after a few rolls, the marker was picked up, obviously by a hand that he could not see for it was at a slant and it hovered above the board just so.

It scribbled something on the board and Joshua had to move forward to read it.

**_My name is Anca Grayson._** Was what it said in very neat penmanship that reminded Joshua of his brother's. Apparently his brothers tales of teaching a spirit how to read and write was true.

_Grayson?_ Joshua thought and instantly the name clicked. This was the child of the trapezists that had died with her parents a few years back. The family Solomon had offered to be buried in their cememtary out the back because the circus wouldn't spare the money.

"I believe you know my name already, but I'll tell you anyway." He said as the board was wiped clean by an unseen hand. "Joshua Wayne. It's an honour to meet you, Anca."

And really, _it was._ Because honestly, it wasn't everyday one met a real ghost.

"I am 75." He said and waited for the girl to write.

**_And I 10._ **

He winced. Ten. Such a young age to die. Of course, he'd known she was ten but to be told that face to... to board, it was different. It made more of an impact.

**_You are Solomon's brother._** It said and Joshua swore Solomon was almost written more carefully than the rest, more neatly. Lovingly almost.

Joshua wondered what it would be like to have only one person to talk with. He was sure if he liked them he'd definitely write their name lovingly too.

It reminded him of how Solomon used to write Agatha when they were on month-long holdiays and he'd write back home. Those had been a while ago. Suddenly Joshua felt older than he had before.

"I am," he said after a tad too long silence. "What.." he paused and realised he didn't know what to say. "What is it like being dead?"

Almost instantly he felt like kicking himself. What way was that to act like a complete asshole in front of a dead child? He was such a dickhead.

The marker hesitated then began writing before Joshua could even begin to formulate his apology.

**_It is lonely._** It stated, clear as day. Joshua felt bad now. **_And_** it paused, **_numb._**

Joshua nodded and his eyes flicked to the heat sensor box that would be able to fit in one of the gate pillars. He had to salvage this somehow.

_Perhaps..._ "Would you like to help me with my work?"

**_The security?_** It asked.

"Yes." He said, "If you'd like to?"

**_Of course._** The board floated mid-air as if it was picked up and moved over to hover at his workbench.

Joshua smiled and thought that maybe ghosts weren't so bad after all.

**_Shall we get started?_** It asked and drew a smiley face next to it. Joshua laughed and sat back down in his chair.


	5. Others Lurk Where Humans Live

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One can never say a rainy day is boring. Definitely not when in Wayne Manor, at least.

Solomon had always taken the fact that Anca was the only ghost in Wayne Manor to be a granted factor.

Anca had a cold wind that followed her, signified it was her, and Solomon knew the feel of it tingling up his back like the back of his palm. It was calm, soothing almost. Solomon held no problems with it.

Recently, Anca had befriended Joshua too, proving her existence and now his brother had brought up the cold draft that was her presence a couple of times. He'd even thought up of the brilliant idea to give her a whiteboard and marker to write with so she could speak with him too. Honestly, Joshua really was a genius.

Now, that cold wind was nowhere near him. Solomon actually knew for a fact Anca was not in the house for she'd said she was going to explore the forest at the end of the grounds today. Yet, there was an inhumane thing touching the back of his neck.

It was cold like Anca felt when his hands passed through her and the contact made his skin tingle.

Solomon whirled around and came face to face with a pair of blood red eyes.

"Who are you?" He asked and those eyes shuttered once before growing and growing and it  _roared_ and God it was loud.

Joshua burst through the library door and skidded to a stop, his eyes wide as the red eyes grew to the size of tyres.

"What's happening?" He screamed over the noise it was now making, loud like a lion and rumbling like a whale's call. It was horrifyingly long. It sounded enraged.

"I do not know!" He shouted back as he jabbed his walking stick into the tough carpet and stole forward, towards Josh, as his brother held his ground.

The thing's -and Solomon was sure it was some sort of ghost too- loud screech turned into a low growl as a ragged, long body began appearing. Materializing before their very eyes.

"What the..?" Josh muttered and Solomon took that to mean he seen it too. The thing's body was covered in a ripped black cloak that engulfed it. The only thing visible was the greyish, slashed up skin it had for a neck and it's shadowed face thanks to a hood.

It's eyes were back to normal size yet the intensity of them seemed to bore into Solomon like a red hot iron tearing into his skin.

Anca burst through the wall, cracking it, and pummeled right into the terrible creature. She screamed in anger and it in anguish as Joshua tugged himself and Solomon out of the room.

They hurried along, bumbling down the stairs as quick as their legs could take them. Together they tried to drown the sounds of ghosts fighting from their ears.

"What do we do?" Joshua said when they were in the main foyer. There was nowhere to go but the caves and even then, if they went there they could be cornered. It was raining outside and even now, over the loud bangs and howls, Solomon could hear as the rain lashed down.

Getting out was truly their only option. Solomon thanked whoever was listening Jarvis was off for the week visiting his family.

"Outside!" Solomon called back, already pushing his walking stick forward to get there. Joshua made a squeaking noise before he gripped onto his arm and tugged him back.

Seconds later the ceiling buckled and the demon-thing appeared from the dust that made their lungs burn. Anca was there too, beautiful white burial dress ripped and torn to shreds with jagged, gushing wounds criss-crossing her all over. The lashes dripped black goo (which seemed to be her  _blood)_  onto the floor, making the carpet hiss and smolder.

Solomon's heart leapt into his throat as he and Joshua dived behind the couch in the living room. They had a clear view to the fighting now and Solomon watched, lightheaded from adrenaline, as Anca dived under the demonic things slashing clawed hands and, with glowing white eyes, kicked him into the nearest wall.

The wall cracked but held firm. One of the paintings further down it did fall to an angle though.

From where they both crouched, knees aching and arms rebelling, Solomon could smell smoke. He smells more than he ever has, clearer because of adrenaline. He is sure his nostrils are the size of watermelons.

Anca shouts something that pushes past the barriers of worlds and as Solomon reels back, so does Joshua.

Everything is so quick, too quick for his old head and how he wishes it wasn't, and in a matter of urgency Anca screams something else to repel against the demonic creature. It  _howls_  like a savage, bloodthirsty beast and then there is silence.

Solomon closes his eyes against a sudden, bright white light that seems to engulf everything. When he opens them again, Anca and the thing are both gone.

Solomon rushes to get up, Joshua too, and as they both stumble into the main foyer -Joshua a few steps ahead- they freeze in their tracks, side by side.

_The Heart of the Wicked is the soul Forgiveness chooses to forgive._

The words engraved into the wall read. They drip the same black goo that was dripping from Anca. Panic sets in like a tsunami.

"Anca?" Solomon shouts and when no answer comes, he worries. "Anca, where are you? Anca!"

A hollow whisper echoes round the Manor and as Solomon's blood pressure rises in stress, Anca reappears.

No longer is she the child in the white dress, now she forebears a dress of tatters. White and black in colour, yet neither both. She looks to be weeping, with long vicious slashes arching down her face and cheeks like tears. Anca offers him a smile, casts the words that bleed a look of disgust, and vanishes.

They do not see her for a while.

The Manor is awfully quiet as a result.


	6. Angels, Robbers and Caves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Indeed?" Solomon wondered how bad it was that Anca would not even consider it. 
> 
> "He suggested we burn down the house and blow up the caves."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys are so kind, thank you for all the positive feedback!

Two months later the brothers were both still reeling from the event, Anca knew. It had been bad for their hearts, she supposed. Too much excitement all of a sudden was never good for anyone. Even for her.

Now Anca did'nay exactly doubt what had happened, she did'nay doubt if it was real, but all the same it seemed so far away, so distant that she could'nay help but feel it was fake.

Yet she knew it was real.

It had been the white light's fault. The Angel's.

_Gabriel,_ he'd called himself, smiling cheekily at her before he waved his scythe and cut the demonic thing in half.

A wandering spirit, the chipper chap had explained. It had went crazy -like all other spirits would- with no bounds to tie it down leaving an Angel to destroy it.

He'd vanished then and Anca had reappeared in front of Solo and Josh and only then had she realised she'd been encompassed in clouds that'd not healed her but changed her.

Things had transpired slowly after that, with days mixing into nights and nights into weeks. Anca found herself loosing track of time and she was helpless to stop it.

 

-/-/-

 

Joshua's death was a blow to Solomon's already aching heart.

Age had made him weary and wise and as his chest tightened at Jarvis' futile attempts at chest compressions, Solomon knew he'd have to say goodbye.

Robbers, they told the police when they'd questioned them both, and the coppers believed it. Robbers had broken in, attempted to rob Joshua while he was alone in the Manor and Joshua had died fighting.

If the supposed bruises and broken bones left behind after a fight were replaced with the black slime of death's blood and the weapon with a wanderer's sharp, jagged claws then no one noticed for no questions were asked.

Solomon was left alone, with Anca's guilt-ridden form floating overhead. He knew she'd tried to protect Joshua, if her injuries were anything to show, and for that alone he was grateful.

The year is 1950, 26th March and Joshua A. Wayne is dead at 78.

 

-/-/-

 

"I'm not alone here," Anca said one dreary afternoon where the sky was filled with storm clouds. "The Angel returned that night."

Solomon knew well enough of the Angel from what Anca had told him of her first meeting. Joshua was dead a week and he did not doubt that when he'd passed the Angel had appeared, probably for the Wandering Spirit.

"What did he say?" He asked, pushing back the memories of weeping over his brothers beaten body. He focused on their present conversation as he flicked through his favourite book.

"This house is a 'hot spot', according to him. The Wanderer's will continue to come until there is nothing to draw them." Anca said, sounding distant as she floated by the window.

"How are they drawn here?"

"The Angel believes it's the caves." She said, quietening with each word.

"Oh?" That was _interesting_ , for sure. "Did he propose a plausible solution?"

Anca hesitated, "No."

"No?" He echoed.

"Not a plausible one," her form wavered, a sign of distress.

"Indeed?" Solomon wondered how bad it was that Anca would not even consider it.

"He suggested we burn down the house and blow up the caves."

A coldness settled in his heart and Solomon understood why Anca didn't dare think upon it. The caves had always been Joshua's and while neither of them had been down there since his passing, neither of them would blow up what was left of him.

Nor the house.

Never the house.

Solomon intended to fix this 'hot spot' problem without loss and he intended to do it before he died and Thomas got the lands in his inheritance.

"You said you were not alone?" He brought up, changing the topic as he remembered the ghost's words. "How so?"

"Bats lurk in the caves and something laughs in the attic."

Why did those two things send dread burning along his veins? Solomon didn't dare dismiss it as anything other than panic. If the land was a hot spot it made sense for other spirits to be lingering, bound or not. He closed his book and pushed it away from him. No use in blindly staring at pages he wasn't reading, after all.

"We put off living here for two years due to bats infesting in the caverns below." He admitted, "Perhaps you can see their spirits?"

"They must be bound to them for they haven't gone mad nor have they moved," Anca pieced together. She turned to him and Solomon saw fear in her dull blue eyes. "What about the attic?"

That.. now _that_ stopped Solomon in his tracks. "I don't believe anyone died up there.."

"Any animals?"

"Possibly," he consented. "Are you sure it sounds like laughter?"

"I've heard it thrice now, Solo." Anca hissed, running her hands through her shoulder length hair as she paced in the air, frustration leaking from her very being. "If it's nae alive then it is dead. I wrote to Jarvis about it yesterday, he says he's never up in there but he cleans the fifth floor. He claims to know of none of the laughter."

"Are..." he rephrased his words. "Have you been up there yourself?"

Anca froze and shook her head. "No, not yet- I just... I have not."

Solomon raised an eyebrow and got a huff of indignance in response. Anca hovered there, uncertainty evident, before she sighed and gave in, floating down to pull out the chair in front of his desk.

"I will," she states firmly, "eventually."

"Of course you will," Solomon nods. "And I will go with you. It'll be an adventure."

Anca smiles and Solomon winks cheekily back.

_Indeed._ He thinks, returning to his book. _An adventure._


	7. Why Must We Part?

 

It takes Anca little time to realise happiness is not permanent. It is fickle and thins with age no matter how much one tries and begs to keep it. Tries to hold on.

Joy is too much like life, she finds. It takes energy yet in the end it does not give. Steals and hoards, it does, as Joshua would've said once upon a time.

Solomon falls ill into mid-December, sending Jarvis into a rushed flurry and Anca into confused anxiety that makes her very being shiver.

Jarvis confides to her one late night in the kitchen, when Solomon has been sick a month. His voice is low and hushed, breaking if he draws out the sound too long.

Anca despises seeing him so in pain.

"The doctor don't think he's gonna make it, lass." Jarvis murmurs, face buried in his hands. His mug of tea sits untouched, steam pouring out of it.

He sounds close to tears and not for the first time does Anca wish she could let him see her but she has no means. Still, as it is she softly pulls out a chair from the shabby island Jarvis sits at and collapses down onto it.

She listens in silence as the chair shudders with age. Jarvis doesn't look up. Yet his shoulders tense up before they begin to shake minutely.

"I don't think he will either," Jarvis admits, sounding stricken. "Solomon's been my boss since I was 19, he's always been there, him and Josh and now... an'... an'..."

Anca sits there, unmoving, as Jarvis cries. Then, she listens and she listens and she waits until she too feels like weeping but by then the time is gone and past.

Anca stands and decides to pay Solomon a visit, leaving Jarvis to pour out his cold tea.

 

 

-/-/-

 

 

Solomon is pale against his bed sheets. The room smells sterile and the curtains are open even though it is night. He's staring out the window with forlorn eyes when she brushes past the crack in the door.

He looks at her and Anca can feel her façade begin to crumble already. She has'nay even spoke yet.

"Anca..." he says and god it's so quiet she has to strain her ears even with the room deathly silent. He's been sick too long now, his vocal cords are long bust and his body long weakened.

It's June now.

He's been sick of December last year.

"I'm here," she says, just a tad louder. Solomon turns his head towards her, hovering above the foot of his bed, and offers a weak smile. Age has chipped at his body, rendering his hair a snow white and his skin a wrinkly, ashen grey. The wrinkles that had formed upon his forehead and around his eyes at Joshua's death have worsened and the robe he wears is such a bold red that it makes him seem small when compared to the huge vastness of his room. Anca is the only one now, the only one left to visit that is not Jarvis. Not even his ex-wife bothered to come. Thomas is out of the country on medical studies.

Anca feels her heart break (though she's not sure she actually has one, being dead and all).

"Good.." he says and nearly drifts off, Anca wishes she could hold his hand. He's dying. They both know it. It's why she's here and there is no doctor.

Solomon is resigned to his fate.

And how Anca wishes he was not.

"Please, Anca," he bursts into heart shattering coughs that paints red spittle on his lips. He licks it away with the speed of a tortoise and Anca holds back her tears as she lowers her weightless form onto the blankets by his side. "Protect my family."

She's nodding before he even finishes. The tears are falling now, curving down the lilts of her scars and burning a hole in her chest. She wishes she could hold his hand, even to just say _goodbye_. "Of course, Solomon. _Anything_ for you."

Solomon's eyes dull, "Thomas. Protect him." He makes a strangled sound and chokes out, "I love you."

"I love you too," she cries as his eyes fall shut and do not open. His chest stops moving and she screams louder than she ever has before until all the objects in Solomon's room are shaking and the walls crack.

Jarvis rushes in and Anca does not care. The furniture floats at head height and everything from the dust to the papers on Solomon's writing desk quiver and seem to scream with her.

The year is 1960, 4th June and Solomon J. Wayne is dead at 88.

 

 

-/-/-

 

 

The house is quiet now and with Thomas set to move in in a few days Anca uses it to the best of her abilities.

She roams the house, testing why she cannot move through walls too many times until she realises it is only living things in which she can freely pass through. Anca cannaye touch freely but if she concentrates -or is in great distress- she can touch things or even make them move without contact.

The attic is avoided.

As is the library.

And the caves.

The attic for the sole reason that the laughter gets louder with each passing day, encompassing the Manor so fully at times Jarvis even remarks about an odd shiver he gets seemingly out of the blue when he ventures near.

Anca tries to forget how Solomon and her had planned to venture up there before he'd become bed ridden. She tries to forget the hollow, aching pain that sears through her chest at the very thought of him and tries to move on.

Time does not heal wounds as so many say, instead it takes such a pleasure of dropping salt into them that it will rip and tear open new veins just for it to torture.

The laughing gets worse the day before Thomas moves in then disappears completely once he sets foot inside the Manor's walls. He cannaye see her and that makes Anca feel worse beyond comprehension.

Eventually, five months after Joshua's death she works up the courage to set foot into the caves. Thomas is off with the army or something of the sort and has given Jarvis as much time as he wants to be with his family, particularly his wife, so she is alone.

All alone.

The best way to die, she remarks coldly as she concentrates and turns the door handle. The small but heavy oaken door swings open and a cold draft wafts upon her so brutally that if she were alive and responded to such stimuli the way the living would, she'd've shivered a fright. As it is, she touches down to the ground and walks in. The door slams shut behind her.

The stairs are large and probably cold as they are metal. They take a while to traverse until Anca eventually gets fed up and toys with the idea of floating down. She wonders how Joshua walked these daily.

That alone is commendable. Her already high levels of respect for the man rise even more.

When she touches the smooth looking floor of the cave she marvels at the beauty in the place for the first time in too long. The floors and walls shine with polished darkness and the tools and benches of Joshua's litter the edges. Anca had forgotten how beautiful this place really was.

She hears the squeak of inhumane bats before she sees them. They lurk in the deeper caverns, she knows, and they do not move home unless forced.

Much like her in a way, only she explores. Neither does she hang upside down to sleep.

Anca spends much too long flitting through Joshua's work, papers and all, and she thanks Thomas silently that he hasn't packed them up yet. He won't, not yet, not until he returns and fully unpacks. Not until he completely finishes his work and returns to finish his hastily done job that was so obviously rushed.

Dust covers each surface and Anca does Thomas a favour (it's moreso for Joshua) in concentrating and lifting each atom of dust and dirt from everything but the floor. She does not intend to do the floor until she looks down and sees her footprints etched into it where she has walked. That alone changes her mind.

She cannaye have Thomas finding footprints least he think the Manor insecure. Though, now that she thinks upon it, the Manor never was claimed to be secure.

Anca does'nay think it ever will anyway, what with it being a spiritual hot spot and all.

After a while she gets fed up with playing with the dust so she dumps it off into the little rivers by the secret tunnel entrance way and watches as it sinks funnily.

Further exploration into the caverns has her finding an entire cave filled with the dead-but-alive bats. She takes a stroll in on a whim and as too many sets of red eyes peel open at her arrival, she backtracks hastily.

She finds a tunnel. It's old and dustier than anything she's ever seen and the sight alone intrigues her.

This tunnel, as secret as it is, is covered with some tarpaulin tarp of sorts. Much like what the Ringmaster had covered the animal's cages with when the party was on the move or when it rained. Anca peels the cover back and finds two staunchly green eyes peering back at her, unblinking.

She screams, drops the tarpaulin and hightails it out of there.

Anca does nae return to the caves for a long while yet.


	8. Tommy Wayne Is In The House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're getting down the family tree now.

 

The Manor is large and Thomas admires it like he did as a young boy. Even now, over ten years later, he can still remember each and every little crevice, each crack and every room despite how short his time there was.

His father is dead five months when he moves in. By the time he has unpacked fully from running about the army and getting degrees and qualifications, it turns into eleven months.

Dust lies laden on the floor as he walks in for the first time in months but he doesn't mind. He rubs his shoe soles on the mat, wiping more dust off it than anything else off him, and sets down his suitcase by the door.

White tarps cover the furniture at the fear of not returning for a while and coming back to destroyed items. Jarvis is still with his wife and will be returning within the week.

Thomas decides to help him out a bit.

Firstly, he pulls the tarps off everything in the living room and kitchen and after digging the vacuum cleaner out of a lonesome cupboard, he vacuums. Then he polishes. And then he mops the floors for no particular reason.

By the time he's done the room looks renewed, regenerated almost. Thomas takes a step back, puts his hands on his hips and stiffens at a cold breeze running along his spine. It almost feels like a hand and too many times has Thomas had a dying soldier reach out for him in such a manner and always does it make him feel guilty. Horrified, he whirls round and finds nothing but the empty hallway staring at him.

Feet pitter patter on the stairwell and after a spilt second uneasy contemplation, Thomas strides out into the hallway. It's as empty as before with the same barren tarps covering the paintings and the chair that sits guard. Most importantly, the stairwell is abandoned. There is no owner for such sounds. 

 _I'm going mad,_ he thinks.

For a moment he pauses, and he lets himself believe he is alone here before he hears a soft, lone whistle from upstairs.

Thomas follows it, heart pulsing, not even loud enough as to even begin to impair his hearing. The stairs are steep and thin and it is hard work climbing up them, especially at the brisk pace Thomas is trying to keep. He makes it to the top of the grand, winding thing and calls out, just a tad too loudly to make himself comfortable.

"Hello?"

Silence lingers for a few moments and Thomas begins to calm, he turns around to go back down and pick up his suitcase then-

A laugh.

A laugh, that was definitely a laugh. One of a child.

He freezes before a medics instincts kick in and he snaps his back straight. He feels naked, weaponless and alone, even in his own home. The feeling is none pleasant and he powers on from sheer force of will alone.

The laugh sounds again and it sounds a floor higher but Thomas does not let it get to him. With tactful precision he opens each door to each room, scans the hollow room that looks as if it's been frozen in time with an expert eye and shuts it again. He does this for each room, five or more in all.

When he makes it to the last door, at the very end of the second floor's hallway, he takes a deep breath and strides over to the spinning stairwell that reaches all the way up to the fifth floor. One foot on it has it creaking loudly and he winces, wondering how someone could get up it without him knowing about it.

Thomas doesn't like this one bit.

 

 

-/-/-

 

 

The third floor is as barren as the second is, but instead of ballrooms and bars and whatnot as is on the first, or the bedrooms which take up the second floor, with all the en-suite guest ones. The third floor is that which houses the Master Bedroom, the library and a rather magnificent spare ballroom. There's a few other rooms but they are less important, aside from Solomon's old museum for lavish paintings and as such, random and ever-changing uses constantly being found for the large spaces. The most recent was storage capabilities.

Tarps cover everything from the bedframe to the paintings. It makes everything look like a haunted playground but Thomas does not falter. He walks on, determination leaking from his bones, even as he comes face to face with a spider of great proportions.

He avoids it with a vengeance. Jarvis can kill the thing later. Or do whatever he does, right now Thomas has no time for it.

A door creaks at the end of the hallway and Thomas is at it in a second, fingers brushing the doorknob. The door swings open and as he steels himself he's shouting in surprise too because a great gust of cold wind hits him from an angle and makes his hair break from the hold the gel has on it.

He hits the ground in a backwards dive and watches, motionless as handprints whirl themselves onto the dusty walls. The wind is too near visible as it thunders down the hallway and up the stairs.

Somehow, Thomas doesn't feel threatened. There's something in its actions that make him follow, because this is how he imagines a child to be. Playful and excited, if channelling that energy into the wrong pursuit.

A memory reappears as he timidly follows it up the dusty stairwell. He sees his father again, and he himself is younger, more naïve.

_"This Manor has a ghost in it, Tommy." His father smiles with the happiness of the sun, eyes scrunched up all secretive and the like, as if he's not meant to be saying this but it makes him happier. "She's around your age, just a bit younger though. Maybe you'll see her someday."_

Thoughts flicker in his head as the rippling wind and he reach the fourth floor. Could this thing be the ghost his father had been talking about so long ago? Thomas regrets not pushing his degree to the side, if only visit his father more. He'd only visited four times whilst-

Guilt welling up inside like a mammoth, he barely noticed the spider until it was inches away from his face. He shouts, batting at it even as he walks into its web that stretches the entire width of the hallway. When he's sure its gone and has wiped the rest of the sticky web off his face as best he can he looks up, ahead of him, to find the wind swirling around, leaning towards him. Almost as if it's looking inquisitively at him.

"Pardon me," he clears his throat, trying to regain some pride he'd obviously forgotten in the living room. "Just a spider."

The wind shivers like it's laughing, the dust swept up by it showing the movement, but no sound comes forth. Nothing moves for a second, both of them content for just a moment to stand there - but can the wind-ghost-child even stand? - before said wind picks up and starts moving forward again.

They pass one doorway on the left side and Thomas peers in through the open doorway to find a bedroom, small but large with warm, memory made trinkets stacked artistically inside. Jarvis'.

Thomas passes by it, not wanting to break boundaries of privacy even when the man is not here.

The wind stops by the next door, happenly on the right. Thomas does not need to look to know it is the library.

It seems to waver for a moment and Thomas wonders why. Before he can ask a tapping sound reverberates from the door and he startles.

The ghost taps on the door again and he understands, apologising, "Sorry. Let me."

Thomas turns the handle and the door floats open, as heavy as it is, revealing a room of white and colour.

The bookcases aren't covered but the three-seater chesterfield over by the fireplace is, as well as his father's desk and the small table and chairs off to the side. The large room is a mere skeleton of its former glorious beauty.

The wind barrels in like a rabbit being chased by a fox, heading straight for his father's desk. It spooks Thomas for a moment before the tarp over the desk shudders like an unseen force is trying to lift it and he understands.

With a grunt and a hefty tug, the tarp comes off revealing a couple books and a lone whiteboard (one made before the commonplace ones, courtesy of Joshua's inventive streak) and marker.

Thomas has no words to voice as the marker picks up, tilted as if in a transparent hand. The whiteboard is written on, it's dust-free state allowing easy words to flow.

 _ **I have heard countless of you, Thomas.**_ It says.

Thomas blinks, "Countless what? If you pardon me, that is."

The wind seems to swirl once more, jumping about the desk and reforming by the whiteboard as more words form, scribbled faster than the first and barely legible past the former black smears of the maker.

 _ **Tales,**_ it says, the turn in scripture almost apologetic. The words vanish with a clean swipe of air, only smearing slightly. Then, _**I am Anca. It is my greatest pleasure to meet you, Tommy.**_

It's stupid us what it is, when a cold, shooting feeling arcs through him at the use of his father's nickname for him. "Ah," he says in time, nodding at the seat because that's where he imagines the girl to be sitting - is he meant to nod at the whiteboard or the wind that swirls? "Thank you, but I must say that the pleasure is mine, Anca. My father spoke of you once but I had dismissed the talk."

 _ **It is hard to believe,**_ she wrote. _**Do not fret of your mind urging you to stick to common morals.**_

And if that doesn't sound sinister in the slightest, Thomas doesn't know what does. He fidgets, an odd occurrence for him but he does it nonetheless.

"I beg your pardon, but how old would you be, Anca?"

The marker hesitates, _**Ten, I think, when I died. I've been here since '45. What year is it?**_

Thomas blanches at that because what us he meant to say? _Oh don't worry only about sixteen years have passed. You're only about twenty-six now._

"It's 1961," he says, calmer than he feels but then, there's a reason why he's the doc to give out the death news, isn't there? "It's been 16 years, Anca."

The marker doesn't move for a moment then it's clattering on the table, bouncing off the whiteboard with perfectly formed words on it, falling to the floor in an instant before Thomas can intervene. A horrible _screeching_ wail pierces the frozen particle thick air, making his ears ring and his world shiver.

He fears he's went too far. That he's divulged information that should've been glazed over at the start but now that it's been brought forth to attention it's shattering the girl in front of him's world. Suddenly, Anca falls silent and the room seems to become empty and vacant.

Thomas shivers in the cold of an unused home, "Anca?"

 _ **Leave.**_ Is scratched into the whiteboard by long, thick lines. It makes a horrible scratching sound, exactly like that of nails running down a blackboard. A scream echoes around the library and Thomas swallows the sound of fear that rises through his throat.

"Right," he says. "I'll see you later?"

Thomas shuts the door tight behind him.


End file.
